LAWRENCE, Mass. — A 74-year-old Alabama man was linked to the 1988 killing of an 11-year-old girl in Massachusetts through DNA evidence, a prosecutor said at the suspect's arraignment on Friday.
Marvin C. McClendon Jr. was held without bail after a not guilty plea to a murder charge in connection with the death of Melissa Ann Tremblay was entered on his behalf in Lawrence District Court.
Tremblay, of Salem, New Hampshire, was found in a Lawrence trainyard on Sept. 12, 1988, the day after she was reported missing. She had been stabbed and her body had been run over by a train, authorities said.
The cold case unit at the Essex district attorney’s office has been working on the case since 2014, and McClendon has long been considered a “person of interest,” authorities said.
A DNA profile of a suspect taken from the girl’s body was linked to McClendon, prosecutor Jessica Strasnick said in court Friday. In addition, a van spotted near the scene of the killing was similar to a van that the suspect drove at the time, she said. No motive for the killing was disclosed.
McClendon, a former Massachusetts corrections officer, was arrested at his home in Bremen, Alabama, last month.
RELATED: No, if a person commits a crime wearing a wig made of donated hair, the donor can’t be implicated
A telephone message seeking comment was left with McClendon’s attorney.
The victim had accompanied her mother and her mother’s boyfriend to a Lawrence social club not far from the railyard and went outside to play while the adults stayed inside, authorities said at a news conference last month. She was reported missing later that night. Lawrence, Massachusetts and Salem, New Hampshire, are just a few miles apart.
McClendon, a former employee of the Massachusetts prisons department, lived in not far from Lawrence in Chelmsford and was doing carpentry work at the time of the killing, authorities said. He worked and attended church in Lawrence.
The girl’s mother, Janet Tremblay, died in 2015 at age 70, according to her obituary. But surviving relatives been informed of the arrest.
“Since her murder in 1988, we have always prayed for justice," an aunt, uncle and two cousins said in a statement last month.
“My aunt Janet may not have used the best judgment in allowing Missy to play around the neighborhood of the social club, but that is between her and God," they added. “She loved Missy and never intended any harm to come to her.”
_____________________________________________________________
Family speaks out following the arrest in 1988 murder
The family of a New Hampshire girl killed in Massachusetts in 1988 are thanking law enforcement officials for making an arrest more than three decades later.
The surviving family of Melissa Ann Tremblay on Saturday said they appreciated that police never gave up on the case, adding they look forward to seeing “justice finally served.”
“We never thought that after 33 1/2 years we would finally see someone arrested and facing a judge,” the family said in a statement provided by Essex County District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett’s office. “The fact that technology has advanced and they were able to follow DNA evidence to find this man has brought us great joy."
Marvin C. McClendon Jr., a retired Massachusetts corrections officer, was ordered held without bail on Friday following his extradition from Alabama, where he lives.
The 74-year-old Bremen resident pleaded not guilty in Lawrence District Court. He's been charged with fatally stabbing Tremblay in September 1988.
The 11-year-old from Salem, New Hampshire had been playing outside in Lawrence while her mother, who died in 2015, was inside a local social club. Her body was found in a nearby railway yard the following day.
Prosecutors said in court Friday that the state crime lab generated a DNA profile from Tremblay’s body and was able to link it to McClendon.
McClendon’s lawyers have suggested it’s possible the DNA belongs to another member of the McClendon family.
But prosecutors on Friday argued that most of his family live in Alabama and have never been to Massachusetts.
They also said the former corrections officer, who retired in 2002, had been living not far away in Chelmsford, Massachusetts, and worked and attended church in Lawrence at the time of the killing.
McClendon was arrested last month. He's due back in court June 17.
